A Darker Kind of Fairy Tale
by Kasan Soulblade
Summary: He's no Prince Charming, a Prince, but no charm.  And she's no Cinderella.  Cosmic humor seems intent to stuff them into the roles.  Life and it's brutalities intervine and the slipper falls between apathatic hands to shatter. These are the fragments.
1. Chapter 1

A Darker fairytale

_And... unlike the tales, where Cinderella flees at midnight, only to be found again after a quest impossible…_

_Her flight is final, all accidental._

_There is no glass slipper left behind._

_Merely the Prince, holing the pieces, wondering._

_Why_

_"Not all tales had happy endings"_

Notes:

_Set during goblet of fire._

_Pairings/Summery: Snape/OC from the all girl school Beauxbatons a dark parody of those "Snape meets someone different, forgets Lily and falls madly in love with his seemingly reborn soul mate" this is less a concise story and more a series of snap shots of that potential situation._

Intro, Not love at first sight.

She smiled, sauntering in amongst a flow of butterflies. He'd scoffed at the stupidity of the feminine stereotype. After all, males have the brighter scales; females are dull things in comparison.

Amused by the unintentional irony he sneered, lips twisting into the familiar bitter pattern.

And she, at the fore, all accidental looks up. Eyes roaming the crowd, passing over the benign and wondering smile from on high (ignoring the envious, the hungry from the crush, with so many options all about it is _curious _that she looks up rather than about)

Wonderment flits across… eyes that were green if only in his hope… but after hope's death are proven to be a dull dead blue.

For him, all colors save green about the eyes are dull. Darkened despite their natural splendor, dulled despite the angle of light and the intent that lights them. It's as if the bitter ash of his love, lost long ago, is smeared over the black of his eyes.

Stealing luster, dimming joy….

And as if she strives to be a living proof to what his heart knows her eyes darkened, as does her expression. Challenge radiates from her and like all the adolescent shows it's a blatant tasteless thing. Her back stiffens; she meets his gaze with unseemly forwardness and refuses to tear her eyes from his.

_Try it_ she mouths.

To that display he raises an eyebrow, wondering, just what she expects him to... _try_.

Smiling, benign, awaiting those who'd come, Dumbledore stands behind a stool, a tattered felt hat at his side.

"Per Hogwarts custom. I would like all who come to be sorted, into honorary houses. Just for your stay…" He assures the ladies behind him, smile widening just a mite more.

Much to the shame of all, though it widens, his smile does not fall off. Only grows to Chesshire Cat proportions as he considers the ladies before him.

Only the ladies.

Flitwick grumbles something to Minevra, something about owing her a gallon. The prim witch snorted, correcting him, it was _three_. Glad to have avoided _that_ indulgence in foolery (he'd have lost, much to his own chagrin), and those blue eyes and their damnable twinkle, he can call the day a decent one. Not good, never that, and thus resolved shifts in his seat. Waiting to see if, or rather who, he'd gather as "honorable" Slytherins.

Even as the first name called (Amelia Astroph) in this fake sorting, his mind is whirling. The dorms would have to be shuffled, rooms emptied to accommodate for their sixty some odd guests. Not that he'd get them all, case and point: the skinny wisp of a girl child seems too fragile to be one of his own snakes… The hat confirms this hollering Hufflepuff and letting out a wry chuckle.

"Go to the yellow table." It advises.

"Oh… ummm…"

And, Sprout smiling, gentle and understanding, all but ushers the confused child along with her gaze.

Perhaps he could settle the "newly sorted" in the first year dorms, and merge the second and first together until all this is over. They'd resent the loss of privacy, schemes were harder to make crammed all together, but he was sure his snakes, old and new (but not faux, he had no hopes for the batch of dunderheads he'd be acquiring at this parody's end) would survive.

Perhaps the littlest of his vipers among the den would learn more with the arrangement.

A good thing for all around.

His first fake Slytherin, a Durmstrang boy (Charlie Callins) is hardly a surprise, still his cheer at aiding his own makes him manage a curt nod to the "newest" viper.

That's enough, the boy returns the salutation and finds his place without undue fanfare.

Of course, he notes with a sneer –his expression so bitter it makes the next "Slytherin" whisper to the Sorting Hat in an overly loud voice if he gets a second option- the girl who met his gaze earlier was sorted in Gryffindor. God just wouldn't have it any other way.

The Irony of it all, he'd note looking back, was sickening, familiar, far too familiar, but sickening all the same.


	2. Chapter 2

A Darker fairytale

Part two: Potions class

With a billow too practiced to be accidental he turns to the indignant raised hand, silken voice lowered it breaks all expectations and though little more than a whisper arrests attention, and all as one look up, awaiting the outcome with baited breathe.

"Because, despite how _sweet and adorable_ animals are in the wild, it is necessary to often dissect, dismember, and disembowel them for necessary lifesaving potions."

The hand falls, and the once proude animal rights defender folds into herself, her psudeo Gryfindor bravory banished at the mere words of one atagonist. Though such a thing so paltry could be considered victory, Professor Severus Snape was hardly one to make a show of such lean winnings.

Twiddling the knife between her fingers, she watches as her house mate (back home, they were dorm mates, why Hogwarts would confuse the issue by making them housemates as well was one of the worlds smaller mysteries) fall to tone and stance alone she continues her twiddilng. And, has to wonder... if sarcasm and snark could be cut away from the syllables, would he still speak? After a moment she decides it's impossible, he exudes a subtle biting sarcasm with every breath. It would be like cutting tension from muscle, both would be useless after the surgery's end.

So she smiled, intent on making a point to disprove his. First step to turning victory into ashes... Stop gapping at her whimpering "house" mate and get to work. She stopped poking at the frog in its stereotypical silver tray, and lifted it up.

Besides her, her partner who'd once been intent on watching the drama (with a smirk so like his Professor's she'd half a mind to wonder who taught it to who), jerks in startlement. Then, to spite the icon of the snake on his breast, he tries chivalry on for size. It wasn't a good fit, in the least. Definitly clashing with his blonde hair and steel colored eyes.

"Wait a second, I'll, I mean..."

She looks up from her work, tipping her head, staring at him with clear, blue, eyes.

"You're a girl, girl's shouldn't be handeling gross stuff like frog's eyes, I'd be more than happy to..."

Her lips quirk, even as she grips the dead frog's swollen throat in gloved hands and squeezes.

XXX

Typical for their gender the mass of girls cringed back, "ew"ing and the like as he describes in clipped sylables the strokes nessescary to force the forg's eyes open withtou making a ruin of the eyes and leaving the potions one forth eyelid upon the eye requisite in tact. These little girls were... _so_ very mature, squealing at each description. His gestures spring forth a low moan and shiver from the most squimish of the lot. Ignoring the crush of fools, Snape concludesh is pointers then sweeps to the table his Godson resides. It would be… inappropriate for the pride of Slytherin to be assigned a new and utterly witless partner. Determination to remedy the situation clogs his throat, as orders for him to change tables flick across his tongue.

To his surprise the "useless girly girl" –so his serpents call the newest surge of students- has gripped the "cute" and "innocent" animal, one squeeze and she smiles, then sets her knife across the animal's eyes, and cuts the closed eyelids a pair of perfect crosses, and squeezes. The amphibians' eyes bug out at the pressure. The one forth of eyelid is nicely attached, the frogs eyes are whole, and unspoiled.

As an aside, Snape notes that Draco's eyes are almost as wide as the amphibian's, a greenish tinge has taken the boy's face.

For that alone, Severus Snape decides to leave things as they are.


End file.
